UNDER THE MULBERRY TREE
by Mistress Grimm
Summary: A revised version of the current story I am working on. This one is for those who wish not to sit through and read all the content provided in the original. Open to criticism.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** I do NOT own Yu Yu Hakusho, nor do I own its characters.

**Warning:** Please consider the genre of this story, thank you.

* * *

The hours on the mechanical face ticked…ticked…ticked…ticked…ticked…ticked on by, day became night and darkness into light, and this was flaunted when the world peered in through the gossamer besmirched windows. Those days rolled on by into weeks, weeks into months, and months into years. Time was king and it showed when ol' neglect settled in, creating a comfortably numb hidey-hole for those barred; for surely this place no longer served its purpose as a home.

More than two years had flown by since despair's homecoming, those years gone in a blink of an eye. The memories were nothing more than mere shadows, ink on life's pages, and those were the only traces that were left as the sands washed away all other likely certainties by every night's end. Everything was gone, everything but this place and the broken soul it harbored, and all he had were his fragments.

The color had faded from those avocado green walls, the fancy wallpaper stained by arcane splotches of yellow plasma. The dusky wood floors were sheltered in dust. The chambers were cluttered, papers and objects scattered all over the place. The trash nearly overflowed the bins, though not stacked all the way up to the ceiling.

A lone figure sat there upon the bed's edge, his jaw slacked, eyes glassy and his stare jaded. He gazed off into the gloom, at nothing in particular. His white overcoat, though immaculate or sterile, was wizened, while the knees of his trousers were dingy. And though his face was clean save for the stroke of stubble upon his chin, his ginger locks were long, pulled back, and had far outgrown that style he donned during the years up to his maturity.

MATURITY: the years before it made it seem promising, but now he could see well that it wasn't at all what it was cracked up to be. Nothing ever truly was what he thought, his hoary fantasies proven to be mere self-delusions. Happiness, he realized, was always feigned. And as for himself, he was painstakingly feckless.

When having snapped out of his dreary daze, he regained his composure and regarded his surroundings. He stood up, the soles of his boots knocking against the wood as he departed from the bedroom.

After having made it downstairs, he wandered almost aimlessly until having noticed the condition in the wastebasket. He collected the trash by having hauled it up by the straps and then tied the bag closed with a knot, and all afore he lugged it outside with him when going out to retrieve the mail. Outside, he disposed of the dreadful bag into its proper container by the curve, putting the lid on it prior to fishing a hand into the letterbox. He pulled out seven pieces and retreated back indoors.

He flipped through the posts, two of which were nothing more than spam, four of which were bills, and…a mysterious letter.

Staring at the envelope, the man noted how it was addressed to him but with no return dispatch, the sender seemed anonymous thus far. Upon further study, he discerned the paper casing to be worn, the ink on the outside fade as though the letter dated years back and, yet, somehow it was singed, the edges burnt, bounded and smudged in soot. There was something awfully eerie about this, even if it was clearly nothing more than inanimate thing. It was not like the letter was going to bite him any time soon, and the idea of such seemed far too illogical and asinine to be considered a possibility. Before he could open it, however, he consciously glanced up at the time and understood well that it would have to wait.

The redhead thoroughly washed and sanitized his hands while at the sink, numbly cleansing them up past his wrists, his sleeves rolled up ahead of time. As soon as he dried his hands with a disposable towel, he grabbed his belongings and marched to the garage.

He unlocked and slid into his compact SUV (sports utility vehicle), jumped the engine and stalled there briefly to allow the motor to warm up. With the engine humming, he shifted the gears into reverse and gently pressed his foot on the gas. The sensors on the garage door went off then, detecting vehicular movement before hoisting up to allow him passage to back out into the driveway. And once there, he yielded briefly and steered out into the road, shifted the gears into drive and drove off, adhering to the speed limit.

Peering down the thoroughfare, he narrowed his eyes at his settings. The conditions were perilous, the land itself insipid, and the atmosphere behaved as a white, vaporous veil.

"Shit! This miasma is as thick as…blood on a knife."

He leaned forward in his seat some, while he tightly gripped the steering wheel, and to the point his knuckles turned a bone white; his fingers were thin, almost meatless. To his bewilderment, he saw how vacant the streets were.

_"…Kazuma…"_

A voice, as faint as can be, sobbed from a close distance.

_"…Kazuma…"_

_"…Kazuma…"_

_"...Kuwabara."_

_"Doctor…"_

_"Doctor… Doctor Kuwabara!"_

_His eyes widened in response to having been addressed so abruptly, having heard an all too familiar voice beforehand, and one of which withdrew his attention until he came crashing back from Neptune. When his sight came into focus, he recovered himself from gawking down at his latex secured hands, the rest of himself clothed in scrubs. In his right hand he held a scalpel._

_He drew his attention upward, a blood bag being the very next thing he saw. The blood oozed, dripping down a long, transparent tube that lead down into a needle, a needle inserted and secure by surgical to the inner elbow of an arm._

_"The patient is under, stable and ready for your next move."_

_He turned to the voice that emerged from his left, and to which then he stared into a pair mahogany pools both individually encompassed by almond-shaped offish white._

_The nurse furrowed her brow in concern. "Are you alright, doctor?"_

_Shifting his eyes from her, his gaze swept around the room, and recognized the awkward stares he was receiving and from whom. There were at least six of them, and they were all gathered, standing around the operation table. His assistant shook his head, grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him over to have a word with him._

_"Are you sure you can do this? You look out of it, been so since…" The man drawled off into Kuwabara's ear, then slid before him, having pulled down his mask to speak more clearly. "We could call in someone else?"_

_Kazuma paused for a moment, and mauled over the option as the heart monitor beeped monotonously from behind. He shook his head a moment later, perhaps having dug his grave rather than coming to a decision._

_His assistant inhaled profoundly. "Listen, you need to get your head straight…" He threw in a cautionary response. "…or else you'll botch this up."_

_In defense, Kazuma scowled at him. "Since when have I ever messed up?" His dark eyes flashed as he leered. "What am I? …Doctor Death?"_

_He hated being doubted, all the more despised being undermined, and loathed being berated by those who held themselves to be far greater than he. Incensed, he wanted to bite this cocky bastard's face, and tear it clean off with his teeth and rip the flesh into tiny pieces so that not even the best surgeons could assist the little shit in looking normal ever again._

_Why so much animosity? Simple, because for awhile that sycophant has had his eyes set on his career since day one._

_The Ph. A. rolled his eyes, finding no hilarity in the situation, failing to identify the threat. "One mistake is all it takes." He reminded him. "Mess up and there will be serious hell to pay. No one will forgive you for that, you know it."_

**_'Mess up and... No one will forgive you for that.'_**

Those words echoed through Kazuma's mind…

…And within a blinding flash, he slammed on the breaks.

The wheels on his SUV screamed, and then only wailed and sputtered when the vehicle nearly spun out of control.

Since when did he have such a lead foot, or a need for speed? He almost ran a red light on his way to…

Say, where was he going anyway? When he thought about it, his mind drew to a blank. All he knew was that he needed to be somewhere…somewhere important. It was clear to him that he was needed, gravely so, but as to where he was needed and what for—that itself eluded him.

He was not needed at the hospital was he? From what he could recall, he was currently on temporary leave.

Kazuma turned off the motor, unfastened his seatbelt, opened the door and slid out of the driver's seat to inspect for any possible damages.

He scoped about for any oncoming traffic, but observed none at all. To his surprise, the entire area was completely void of all life, even when…downtown?

…Where was everyone?

Something was not right about any of this, and the town itself was not at all recognizable. The vicinity was grungier than usual, vapid even, and the man-made structures stood like villainous silhouettes looming in from a distance. All the more maddening, the fog made it nearly impossible to see shite.

Other than his own, not a single soul was around.

Everything was so still, there was a silence that echoed in an ominous ring.

Kazuma hopped back into his ride.

"Fuck this place, damn Ghost Town."

Instinctively he reached to turn the key, only to fondle around on the wheel after his grip clasped upon nothing more than thin air. The key was missing, and the first clue should have been the ceasing of the incessant digging that always accompanied when leaving your key in the ignition point.

He glanced down on the floorboard, shifting around in the seat to see if the key had somehow fallen down there. After failing to detect his keys thus far, he jumped out of the vehicle and began checking under the seat, in the cracks, the built in coasters, and even in the door panel—though that itself was a ridiculous thing to do. The ginger even went as far as to check around and under the automobile, that is, he crawled around on his hands and knees for a measly two minutes…in vain!

There was Nothing, Naught-a, Zero, Zilch, or a Nil.

He turned up empty handed, and with no keys in sight he spat out obscenities. After surveying his surroundings with yet another turn, he climbed back into the SUV to retrieve his cell. Yet, once he slipped back inside, something bizarre caught his eye…and it was not his cellphone.

The mysterious letter from beyond…had appeared mysteriously in the front passenger's seat.

"What the fuck?"

Exactly!

Maybe the letter was alive after all? He certainly could not recall ever bringing that thing with him. Hmm, it being "haunted" sounded like a far more reasonable explanation than it sprouting legs and sneaking into his vehicle and then finally somehow crawled itself up into the seat while he was not looking.

He reached over to pick up the letter, but suddenly hesitated when fear crept over him.

Fear? Afraid? Afraid of what? What was he thinking? That superstitious attitude never helped him any at all in the past, so why would it now? If anything, he learned to face the issues ahead and head on, rather than dealing with them later when he "felt" like it. Had not life taught him that important lesson at an early age?

Fight? He always had "fight" within himself, for he did not and could not ever succumb to defeat.

**_'It was better to burn quickly and bright, than burn slowly and dull without a fight.'_**

This "iron man", no matter how feckless, was NOT going to be a slave to his fears, and so he fought.

The psychic took hold of the envelope and traced the sullied edges with his thumb, all afore he carefully tore it open. Upon reaching into the packet, he discovered a folded piece of parchment. He removed the paper from within its holder, and that the paper revealed to be smeared by dismal hues on a crude drawing.

Kazuma's eyes broadened, three times the size, while his rustic, orpiment (colored) orbs contracted.

Had he seen this before…somewhere…?

He drew this when he was six. The psychic could not remember why, when exactly, or for what reasons, but he knew he drew this and at that age, the greatest tipoff being that his name was written alongside the year on the back of the parchment. The recollection persisted to evade him.

The illustration was that of a building, an eerie one at that for the entire structure was painted black.

The structure was not the only thing that caught his eye, however, as there was a figure…a menacing character surrounded by a pool of red, and likewise covered in "bleeding" shadow. The being looked to be man yet beast yet nothing in between, and with a fearsome blade in hand he was cutting through space… The thing was cutting through dimensions.

The thing was cutting through dimensions, carving out the sky as IT peeled the blue back like skin from a piece of meat.

Kazuma coughed down at the drawing as a sudden blow of nausea went straight to his gut. His digits glossed over the thin layers of wax, and the paper's crisp edges stung his skin.

What a bizarre, disturbing piece of art. Did he really have such a warped mind as a child? Never mind that. Who in hell was responsible for sending him this mess in the first place? Was the old man playing some sort of sick joke on him?

None of this was making sense, not a single lick.

He shifted his awareness onto other details. There were these bird-like creatures in the illustration, though he was not so sure if they were genuinely birds. The firmament itself appeared shattered; the dimensional membrane was cracked like an opaque mirror only to be flayed away by a ghastly fiend.

What kind of child draws these sorts of things?

Oh, right. He drew it, he drew this…eyesore.

All the more unsettling was the monster's ability to cut through proportions, how it manipulated reality. …And with a blade? No, it was clearly a sword.

Kazuma's breath hitched when he discerned the familiarity.

Was this a prediction that had come to pass or is it one yet to be? How did he, as a boy, know that such a feat was even feasible? And who was the foreboding figure exactly?

It could not be him, it just could not be. Why? The entity looked nothing like him, that's why. What with the red hood with its overcast which shrouded its features, the gruesome grin, and the savage demeanor overall. There were no eyes on the guy, none drawn at all, just…blackness.

But was he so sure about that? How did he know he was not in denial? And—oh, yeah, did he take note that he could not see the being's face?

It all had to be a coincidence, or so he kept telling himself over and over for about five minutes until he managed to push the whole idea aside.

There was another thing about that picture, where the paper was littered with depictions of vaults and stones and all to which was fenced in by enormous bars.

This he had no difficulty following, perhaps even inclined to, due to the personal experience of when dealing with the dead. Whether it this was due to his keen psychic gifts, or the loss of life in the emergency room, death was always impending around him. He understood well that he could not escape death, as all people do. Death was inevitable.

After folding the paper in quarters, he stashed the drawing into his coat pocket and all prior to the search for his cellphone. He combed about in the vehicle for the device, including having checked the glove compartment and the compartment under the armrest, before it suddenly dawned on him— He had inserted his phone into the receptacle strapped on his belt, and had done so since before he had left his house. He reached behind him, on the right side of himself, and retrieved the mobile.

With the device in hand, he tapped the screen and lo and beheld that the service was without connection. Baffled, he did not understand as to how the location could be a dead zone. He was in what was known to be the busiest part of town, for crying out loud!

He swore acridly, but then swiftly fell into silence when his eyes beheld her face.

Yukina, his dear sweet Yukina…

She was his consolation in this mad, abysmal world. She was precious. She was a pure, melodious vision.

Inversely, his existence was flawed in comparison, his rind marred down to the marrow with battle scars.

He remembered the fresh scent of her creamy flesh, the silky texture of her watery "sea foam" hair, and the way she peered up at him with those crimson puddles of hers. He studied the fine details of her lips, noting how petite her mouth was, and how delicate the lines were. Her gaze reflected her innocence while those eyelashes laced kissed lids, beauty unspoiled…

…Violated. …Complicated, faceless, and broken. The ginger was undeserving of her, as he had been told so avidly by those who knew him.

Fate was cruel, as was life in general.

Having comprehended that it was only a snapshot, he sucked in a quivering breath. He pressed the power icon on the monitor and returned the mobile back into its holder, securely. And with the need for assistance in mind, he slunk out of the vehicle, locked the doors and began trekking.

**...TO BE CONTINUED...**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** I do NOT own Yu Yu Hakusho, nor do I own its characters.

* * *

The dank air was thick and suffocating, his surroundings drowned by a sea of white. The whole experience was like meandering within a glass filled with diluted milk.

Kazuma gagged, entirely disgusted with that concept. He abhorred milk. Yeah, sure, he drank plenty of that stuff whilst enduring an insufferable youth, but that was before he realized how nasty milk genuinely was.

Now, I bet you're wondering: How did this come about? Well, a long story short… Whilst he was in medical school, Kazuma had taken it upon himself to learn nutrition and, as an upshot, gave his diet a total revolution. He had developed a completely different perspective on sustenance, you see, and became more particular as to what he was shoving down his throat. And quite frankly, he could not believe some of the foodstuff he used to consume, like the illiterate boob that he once was.

So, definitely, he was beginning to really despise the fog. What with the cold mist which seemed to rain in on him from all angles, and the dampening cold that penetrated into him as the moisture itself had begun to soak well into his attire. Still, the sky was becoming abysmal, a dark and a thundering portent of doom.

He cursed under his breath at the unremitting climate conditions, sensing it in his bones that it would rain soon. The man could literally feel it in his battle scars, his chest particularly.

Kazuma winced. "My heart is throbbing like a son-ova-bitch."

Unfortunately, the only good news about the rain was that it would clear away all the haze. And the bad news, of course, was that he would be caught in the midst of that, like he needed to be washed away with all the rest of the stench and filth.

Already a sickening ache was settling within him.

He needed to find shelter, and how?

Good question.

Somewhere, wherever it may be, that presented a payphone… Such an arbitrary thought, for since when were there any kinds of phones accessible to the general public?

Without warning, the image of his childhood crayoning, the one he had reacquainted himself with prior to now, had flashed before him.

The psychic hardly cringed when his shoulder grazed against a chainwire fence, the tiny barbs rending shallow gouges in his flesh. Somehow, the metal had managed to break the surface of his skin…without damaging a single thread of his clothing.

This fog had made him susceptible to just about anything.

He craved to somehow sever through this insufferable brume.

Wanting out of this fog, and as soon as possible, Kazuma picked up the pace.

The soles of his boots bashed against all in his path, breaking the dead stillness with the thwacking sounds that reverberated off the surroundings. Though the beat was originally faint, it was magnified ten times by the obscured structures.

He continued to hoof his way down the pavement, shadowing the chain-link fence until he had reached its end. Upon reaching the edge of the sidewalk, he traversed through the empty thoroughfare, never minding the pedestrian laws as he ran. He suddenly bolted midway in the intersection, shortly afterward, when he beheld with his eyes—

"…Blood?"

—Smeared on the asphalt beneath him.

With catholic eyes, he faltered and took several steps back. "What the hell happened here?_"_

He scanned the road, noting the bits and chunks of flesh were spread across the surface like marmalade on toast. The expression upon his features contorted, supposing that a terrible accident had occurred sometime recently… But that did not explain the peculiar characteristics of the streaks, which come across as though someone drenched in blood had wallowed on one lane and then tottered off down another.

Kazuma studied the stains, observing how fresh they actually were, as his eyes followed the trail to the left of him. That was when he had caught sight of a silhouette, one that lurched away and disappeared into the fog.

Wait. There was someone here after all?

He palmed his face, deadpanned at how slow he had proved himself to be just then. _"Duh. Where the fuck else could the blood have possibly came from?"_

…Blood?

Ascertaining by how incredibly awkward the person's gait was, or at least by what he had seen, there was no doubt in his mind that the individual was terribly injured.

"SHIT." He hissed at himself.

However, there was something mightily strange about this. He had not sense any source of life or energy in the entire area, not even from the figure. And yet, as unnerving as these contexts were, the philanthropist within himself had kicked in, and so he pushed his own needs aside and proceeded after the character.

"HEY. COME BACK!" Kazuma called out as he ran blindly through the mist. "HOLD ON! I'M A DOCTOR! I CAN HELP YOU!"

No shit, Watson. That's what doctors generally do.

The clouds above him revolved like a wheel as the light around him had begun to wane.

Darkness draped over the entire town, perturbingly suffocating the remaining light like an opaque coverlet drawn over a sleeping newborn. The unforeseen blackness almost blinded him, having swiftly encroached upon his reality.

Well, this was not what he had expected.

He balked, nearly crashing into a large, hollow pole. But as a result of having knocked against the sluice anyway, a dull clanging vibrated in his ears.

"Shit. Shit. Shit."

Fortuitously, he could see the energy that made up the structures with his inner "third eye". Nevertheless, until his eyes attuned, he pulled out his cellphone and employed the built in flashlight.

In frustration Kuwabara sullenly ushered a breath out between his pressed lips, and he did so as he roamed tenaciously about in the dark for a moment or two, searching with that wee fluorescent light until he rediscovered the bloodstain imprints he had been following thus far.

Almost immediately then, his ears singled out a strange whirring.

His gaze followed that rustling hum skyward, hearing grating and crackling sounds, as well as metallic tings. He anticipated the overhead streetlamps to flicker on, but none of that came to pass.

The psychic cursed, all the more thwarted.

Actually, he broke out into a sweat and, as hot and cold chills washed over him, his body was virtually consumed by tremors.

He, likewise, became goose pimply.

Why?

Kazuma detested this kind of dark, for this swathing obscurity reminded him of the dark entities whom he had often dealt with in his childhood. Quite frankly, he was as anxious as a cat in a bag in a watery hell.

An ominous light flashed above him in a tree-like pattern, rippling through the black space. As this occurred, the billows themselves greatly resembled a monstrous body of dark, violent water, as though a tumultuous sea had somehow suspended itself there where the sky should be.

Regardless of the astounding phenomenon, be that as it may, he picked up his feet and bolted.

"_Look at you. You're weak."_ He suddenly heard a voice come at him and from out of nowhere. _"You've always been weak."_

Kazuma recognized the voice, and it belonged to none other than Hiei. But frankly, he had no idea as to why he would be thinking of that bastard, let alone be hearing his voice inside his head and at a time like this.

"Fuck off, dickhead!" The psychic swore as he pressed on, having reinstated his attention toward the blood trail. He was determined to find the person before it was too late, not wanting to leave whoever it was behind in this terror.

"_You're a useless fool."_ He heard the voice continue as he resumed tracking. _"You don't deserve to exist, much less breathe."_

"_Spare me your bullshit!"_ The psychic heard own voice resound in that retort and yet he had not spoken another word. _"You don't know what the fuck you're saying!"_

"_Hn. Says you."_ The demon defied, his voice dripping with his usual smugness. _"The way I see it, the universe should have omitted you from creation."_

"_Is that so?"_ He heard himself sneer. _"Funny hearing that from you, since you are the universe literally taking a load on itself! In fact, you are the steaming pile that it squeezed right out of its asshole! GO FUCK YOURSELF, YOU LITTLE PIECE OF SHIT!"_

A loud, guttural roar thundered around him as ruby droplets crashed down onto his dashing form.

Ever obstinate, Kazuma kept his gaze at the road, mindful of any obstacles that may arise in his path. Aside, he noticed something else that was inexplicable… The asphalt was now grotesque and littered with deep cracks, marred far more than he remembered, while the sidewalks were covered in a sordid grunge.

Meanwhile, his eardrums were hammered with a sudden bombardment of explosions, whereas their sonic waves aggressively shook him near off his feet.

As an air raid siren howled into his reality, he felt as though something was clawing at him from behind…

…Something...not so friendly…

…And as perplexing as it may sound, he felt the skin of his face begin to sizzle and burn.

But as the lurid nightmare came, and though it had not lifted just as swiftly, the blackness finally dispelled and all faded back to the way it had been before.

Panting, the sensitive slowed down to a halt.

"The fuck? What the fuck was that about?" His gaze roved as he regained his composure. "Am I tripping balls or did that shit seriously happen?"

He even checked himself everywhere for a sign but there was none and, though his coat and other attire were damp, he was clean.

"The fuck?" He wheezed.

After realizing that he had ran a whole few blocks, his train of thought was suddenly disrupted by a loud fizzing roar. He whirled himself on his heels to face the source and beheld a dull, four sided light shimmering like a ghost in the fog. As he drew closer to this light, it became clear to him that the hideous sound was "white noise" and it emitted from a black box with a flickering screen. And though there was no picture, he detected the clear pang of a heart monitor.

Amongst the interminable electronic rain and vital beeping, rang through another sound…wailing.

Screams resounded from out of the speakers, as though the voices themselves emanated from deep within a precipice. He conceived an impression that there were many of them, as though they were writhing in torment, terrorized by something he could not see.

"Kuwabara!" he discerned a distorted shriek from amidst the racket.

Kazuma had glowered almost immediately when having distinguished whom the voice belonged to. "…Urameshi?"

At first, he thought he was merely hearing things, but that clearly was not the case when the screaming continued.

"I'M…, KUWAB…!" Though ambiguous, a message managed through. "I'M…RRY! I…SO…ORRY! I…ailed…! …GOD…YOU F…BASTARD! OH SH…! NO!"

Without warning, the light from the screen withered out with a flash while the frequencies were succumbed by silence.

He tensed up.

Was this some sort of joke? It better NOT be for whoever's sake, for if this was a hoax he was going to give whoever was responsible a fat, repulsively bloody lip.

Well, actually that was putting it lightly.

"I'm going to fuck them up..." He hissed beneath his breath, forcing the words through bared teeth. "...Bury them alive, then dance and piss on their grave!"

As he balled his hands into tight fists, Kazuma noticed that the glass in the window was glazed over in a repulsive substance. He grimaced to himself, having recognized the film to be ectoplasm. Though the window was protected by black iron bars, areas of the glass were fractured with holes. The clammy iron was corroded, eaten away by attrition.

Upon further examination of the windowpane, he spotted a peculiar notice posted on the outside of the window.

Kazuma narrowed his eyes as he studied the paper closely.

"SON OF SAMEK…" He read the bold letters printed in standardized font. "…THE ELOHIM OF DEATH."

Skepticism was his initial reaction, but that dwindled when he noticed that the figure's face had been scratched out.

He grunted. Someone obviously despised the guy, and to which he could relate with. People often proved themselves to be ridiculous. Even more, he figured that when having seen the hate speech handwritten all over the poster.

"THE…BOGEYMAN…" Kazuma read one out loud, ignoring the more vulgar scratches. "All beware…the son of Sam. Not all reap what they sow."

Well, whoever this guy was, Kazuma could see that he was overtly masculine, muscular, and robust with broad shoulders.

After taking several steps back, he surveyed the structure before him for a sign.

Slowly but surely his surroundings became more distinctive, though the dense haze still remained.

He observed the peculiar symbolisms painted upon the structure's walls. One of the symbols was that of an upside-down pentagram, with an eye as its midpoint, and to which was encased by three circles. There were crosses, too, and others reminded him of geometrical shapes on acid. Though he had seen these symbols somewhere before, they were not traditionally of his culture. Then again, he was not exactly sure where he had seen these symbols. He just had a gut feeling that they meant something to him…perhaps something important?

"HIROKO'S HOARD…" Kazuma stared at the sign that hung over the walkway. "…Hiroko's Hoard? What the hell? Where have I heard that— Wait. The old man use to come here."

He backed up more, only to rear-end into something. Still on pins and needles, he spun around only to realize that he had bumped into a street post, with him now standing on the corner of the sidewalk. And that was when he peered up with those dark, beady little orbs of his from those deep sunken eyes.

"No… No way…" He shook his head in disbelief, having read the street signs. "Is this a coincidence or am I…losing my shit?" His eyes were wide and unreeling, though only after having bulged in their sockets. "This..."

Kazuma took off in whichever direction.

Chop-chop!

He ran down the street and meandered around, determined to blow this situation out of the water. However, the proof of the pudding was in the eating and he quickly realized the truth. Of course, he did not run about throughout the entire city, he was smarter than that, though he did waste a good ten minutes or so before he located a public map about seven blocks down.

Mind you, he could not see past eleven feet, thirteen feet maximum, in this fog.

Upon examining the map at the metro stop, color drained itself away from his complexion.

"This can't be… I left that—this fucking hell hole years ago!" Kazuma yelled at the map in an accusing tone. "How did I get here? I was miles away from here moments ago! WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?"

Pressure had built well up inside of him; he was a walking, breathing glass case of emotion.

He slammed the bottom of his boot against the metro chart and deliberately smashed it against the concrete. The metal bars had snapped on impact, amazingly, while the safety glass had been crushed.

Now, that was just pointless.

Slowly backing away from the spot, he raked his fingertips up past his temples and back across his scalp. After gripping his hair by the roots, his hands dropped back to his sides afore his shoulders slumped.

Jumping into traffic seemed like an awfully good idea right about then, but as far as he could tell the entire town was empty.

Everything was empty and decrepit. The buildings appeared abandoned and were smothered in years old mold, filth and dust, while the smudged windows and doors were boarded up. Trash and litter was scattered everywhere.

What happened to this place? It was nothing like this when he left. And there was no way in hell that he was reason as to why this place fell apart.

"This can't be…" His voice cracked as his tone weakened. "…This can't be…"

By then his skin was crawling, while his nerves tingled and prickled as if stung by tiny ants. As his muscles shuddered, he knew that he was suffering from "nervous tics".

Though he had often referred to it as "The Tickle", he had been diagnosed with a Neurological Syndrome as a child. This explained the recurring anxiety and the twitching nerves, of course, but not the actual horrors that came with them…

Time and time again, nervous disorder or not, his demons have been proven to be real and "the tingles" served him as an effective warning method.

Something was undoubtedly near.

That was when he remembered the silhouette.

You know, the "obviously injured" person whom he had been following since the last chapter?

The poor soul had lumbered off…but to where exactly? He assumed by now that, after having taken into consideration the massive amount of blood loss, either the person had somehow managed to get to the hospital or…

…Had died alone in a gutter somewhere.

"Fuck!"

A loud panging resounded in his head.

**...TO BE CONTINUED...**


End file.
